The Marauders
by HouseoftheBadger
Summary: Remus is sad and his friends want to cheer him up on the same time as they want to make him an official member of their group - which sadly enough haven't got a name yet. So obviously Remus is going to have to participate in a prank.
**Disclaimer: Harry Potter and the Marauders belong to J.K Rowling, the queen of the Wizarding World.**

James, Sirius, and Peter had been friends with Remus Lupin for a little more than a month now. They all really liked him, and he fit in perfectly with them. He was intelligent, funny and even James and Sirius had to admit that it was good that they had someone who knew where the limits went, which they didn't (Peter maybe did, but he never said anything). He often seemed sad for some reason, and sickly and exhausted, but he could also be very happy and laugh and joke. Sometimes James felt that Remus seemed better with helping Sirius when he was down because of his family – which was a little strange seeing as Remus didn't seem to have any problems with his own family (selfishly James was happy that Sirius still seemed to prefer him, and he felt kind of bad for thinking that. The most important thing was that his friends were happy, not that he was the one who made them happy).

Remus had just come back to Hogwarts after being home for two days to attend his Great Uncle Pierre's funeral and had even more than usual seemed to have a hard time to decide whether he would be sad or happy. It was almost worrying, especially since Remus had assured them that he wasn't sad over his great uncle's death – he had barely met him.

Their newest member of their group – which still didn't have a name and that bothered James and Sirius – was in the library right now, doing research for their Potions homework. Neither James nor Sirius cared about it, they both thought they were too gifted to study (which was pretty much true, they had succeeded to get fantastic grades already without studying) and Peter didn't feel like doing it, so Remus did it with Lily Evans.  
The two black-haired boys were playing Exploding snap in their dormitory – before they had shared the room with a fifth boy but he had moved out from the dorm two weeks ago because the four friends never gave him any peace; not that the boys had noticed it yet, and Peter was watching and cheering them on.

"Jamie! James! _James_!" James was awoken from his thoughts by his best friend who was waving his hand in front of his face. He winced in surprise and Sirius grinned, delighted when he saw that he finally had gotten James' attention. "It's your move."  
He nodded and did his move but then he shook his head and looked up at Sirius.  
"You know what, Siri?" he asked vaguely and Sirius tilted his head to the side, interested in what James had to say. The tone he used right now mostly meant that something fun was going to happen.  
"I think it's been _way_ too long since we pranked someone." Sirius' eyes widened in excitement and he smirked in appreciation. "And I want Remy to join us. Maybe it can cheer him up."

Sirius nodded eagerly and grinned.  
"Great! Let's go and fetch him!" he said and stood up, throwing his cards on the floor. He looked expectantly at Peter who looked at them, unsure what he was supposed to do. "Coming, Pete?"

Peter nodded and stood up, following James and Sirius out of the dorm. They cheerfully discussed what prank they would do, and they walked toward the library. A few students gave them worried gazes when they saw the mischievous looks on the two best friends' faces and Peter's excited look. Especially the Slytherins, who had already learned that those looks couldn't mean anything good on the three boys. They had been calmer after they had befriended 'Loony Loopy Lupin' (though if you called him that, you would be hexed by James and Sirius who both knew surprisingly good hexes for first years (might have something to do with that Sirius was a Black)), but they had in no way stopped with the pranks.

* * *

They got some strange looks from their fellow 1st year Gryffindors, Emelié and Luke, who saw them enter the library. Sirius grimaced in distaste as he looked around.  
"Yuck. Studying. Come on, let's find Remus so we can get out of here."  
James and Peter nodded, agreeing, and they looked around in the library. At the back of the library they saw Remus and Evans sitting in front of a table with books open on it.

Neither looked up as they got closer, probably didn't even realize that they were on their way to get company, so Remus was entirely unprepared when he suddenly felt a hand grab his arm. He gave out a little cry and seemed to shrink for a moment before he realized who it was and frowned. The librarian, Mr Bulstrode, hushed him with a strict look and Remus looked apologetic at him before turning back to his friends.

"What's going on?" he asked, a little sharply. Apparently he was still a little mad after being scared like that.  
"We've come to save you from the eternal boredom of studying." Sirius announced solemnly and gave Evans a look. "Sorry, Evans. We're stealing him from you now."  
James and Sirius took a grip on each of Remus' arms and began to drag him out of his chair. Remus looked helplessly at Evans and the books.

"My books…!" he pointed out and Evans, who until now had just stared at them, woke up.  
"Hey! Let go of Remus!" she ordered but James only grinned.  
"Nope. He's coming with us."  
Evans opened her mouths to protest but Remus smiled slightly.  
"It's okay Lily. We can do the rest later."  
She nodded.

"Alright. I'll take your books." She promised and Remus quickly thanked her before getting dragged out of the library and toward Gryffindor Tower. His friends refused to explain anything until they had reached their dormitory, so Remus was left for fearing the worst.

* * *

Remus waved awkwardly toward the crowd in the common room as they watched in amazement how the smallest of the four friends practically got dragged upstairs and as soon as they reached the dormitory James put his hands on Remus shoulders and pressed him down on Sirius' bed.  
They all looked very solemn. Remus raised an eyebrow when they didn't say anything for a while.  
"Well? Are you going to tell me why you kidnapped me from my studying?" he asked them amusedly. James and Sirius looked at each other for a moment before nodding once toward the other one.

"We have decided that it is time that you officially became a part of our group, Remy-poo!" Sirius said and Remus grimaced.  
"Stop with the nicknames!" he complained and pressed his hands on his ears. James grinned and bended them away.  
"No way." He snickered before looking solemn again. "You are going to pull a prank with us. No objections."  
Remus gaped at them.

Until now, he had simply escaped to the library when they were going to do something, after making sure it was nothing too dangerous, or something that could get them expelled. He had done pretty well in keeping them out of trouble, seeing who his friends were. He hadn't gotten a detention in his whole life – not even a curfew after the age of six since his parents knew he wouldn't try anything – and now his friends wanted him to play a prank? In school? At Hogwarts? Where he had always dreamed to go, and by a miracle had been allowed to attend? But there was still the key word. Friends. But well, there was only one reasonable answer to that.  
"Absolutely _not_!" He exclaimed. "I do not do pranks."

James', Sirius' and Peter's mouths formed O's and they stared at Remus in shock. Then they slowly turned to each other and kept staring for a few moments before they turned back to the young lycanthrope. After another few moments they all almost yelled:  
"What?!"  
"You cannot not do pranks!" James told him, shocked.  
"Yeah! Come on, Re!" Peter agreed and once again the brunet grimaced at the nickname.  
"You simply must be a prankster! You're our friend, you've got no choice!" Sirius added.  
"No. I won't do it." Remus withstood. His three friends looked at each other once more before making stubborn faces.

"You will." The Black Heir said.  
"I won't."  
"Will too."  
"Won't."  
"Will!"  
"Won't."  
"Will!"  
"Won't."  
"Will!"  
"Won't!"  
"Will!"  
"Ugh, _fine_!" Remus gave in. "But it's your fault if we get caught and expelled."  
"Yessss!" Sirius did a victory gesture with his fist and high fived James. Both of them grinned widely.

They all sat down on Sirius' bed and began to plan the coming prank. To the shock of James, Sirius, and Peter, Remus had really good ideas once they had gotten him to join in, which took a little while. He even came up with some absolutely ingenious ideas.  
"It's a wonder you don't get caught more often if you do it this way. Do this instead." In different variations became a standard line from the lycanthrope.

After a lot of coaxing, they got out of him that he used to be a prankster as a small child but stopped at the age of six. But he absolutely definitely refused to tell them why, so they had to give up on that one.

A few hours later they had decided on a prank and planned it. They would go through with it tomorrow morning. There were four excited boys that went to bed that night. Even Remus couldn't help but feel anticipation, even though he feared the professors' reactions. It had been years since he pranked someone. He had stopped at the age of six when he decided that he shouldn't do these things anymore since he was now a monster. And either way, he didn't really have the spirit that was needed for pranks anymore after over a year of painful transformations every month, and sometimes twice in a month.

* * *

The next morning Sirius woke up first, as usual, and almost as soon as he had finished his hair, Remus climbed up from his own bed. Together they woke James and Peter up and got dressed. Then they put their plan into action.

Remus and Sirius would go down to the Kitchens – they had found the Kitchens of Hogwarts only two weeks prior after an incident involving angry Slytherins, a cat that was also a professor and a teapot smelling of chocolate – and give a potion James had in his bag, and a spell Remus had read in a book about jinxes and hexes. He had gotten it from his mother before starting at Hogwarts and was glad to finally make use of it. James and Peter will go to the Great Hall and look innocent – or rather, not look innocent because it was when they looked innocent people began to be suspicious. Hopefully everyone wouldn't worry about Sirius not being there since Remus wasn't either and expect Remus to keep him in line. James smirked at the thought, seeing as the whole prank was almost entirely planned by the "good one" who had turned out not to be such a goody-two-shoes after all.

They took the Invisibility Cloak, which Mr Potter had given James when he began attending Hogwarts, and left to walk down the Tower and hallways to the entrance of the Kitchens. They made sure no one was there and Remus tickled the pear which giggled before the door swung open.

As usual it was a frantic activity in there, especially since breakfast would begin in ten minutes and everything had to be in place. As soon as the door closed they dragged the Cloak off their heads and became visible again. Almost immediately one of the house elves turned up in front of them.  
"Can Tobey give Master Sirius and Master Remus something?" the old house elf asked, smiling. When they had first found the Kitchens, Sirius hadn't been very kind to the elves and had treated them as his own – which he had practically been raised by, and grown up hating – but after a great scolding he had been given by James, he had apologized to the elves and they were quick to forgive. In fact, many of them had been so overwhelmed over having a wizard apologizing to them and another yelling at another wizard for their sake that they now loved the boys like there was no tomorrow.  
"Can you show us to the Slytherin-table, please, Tobey?" Remus asked with a smile. "We have something that will make their food even more of an experience, if that is possible seeing how good your cooking is."  
The elf blushed of happiness and he hurried to take them to the Snake's table. Sirius grinned as he uncorked the bottle he had gotten from James and let a few drops of it into every vial of the pumpkin juice before Remus took out his wand and muttered a spell over each one of them.

When they were finished, they turned to the closest elf, since Tobey had left to go and help make the breakfast ready.  
"Thank you." Sirius said. It was still strange to be polite to house elves but he had to admit that these were much nicer than the elves in the Black household. She smiled.

* * *

Sirius and Remus made their way out of the Kitchens, left the Cloak in the dorm and ran the fastest they could toward the Great Hall. They did not want to miss this.  
At the same moment as they burst into the Great Hall and began making their way toward their friends at the end of the table a cry of rage reached their ears and they saw about ten people at the Slytherin table with scarlet hair and golden loops.  
They bit their lips to keep themselves from laughing but when they reached James and Peter and met their gazes they couldn't stop themselves.  
They began to roar with laughter.  
Soon other people joined in and the biggest part of the Hall was laughing at the scarlet headed Slytherins.

"POTTER! BLACK! PETTIGREW!"  
McGonagall's voice was heard and everyone immediately fell quiet. That is to say, everyone but James and Sirius. As she came closer Sirius dropped into an elegant bow.  
"Ah, Professor Minnie." He said pleasantly. "What can we do for you today?"  
"I know you marauders did this! And my name is Professor McGonagall, Black. Five points from Gryffindor."  
James opened his mouth to answer when another voice – an unexpected one – joined in.  
"Professor, I feel that that is very unfair." Remus said. Everyone turned to him in shock. James, Sirius and Peter perhaps most of all. He had participated eagerly in the prank as soon as they had gotten him going, but they had not expected him to take part in the usual 'interrogation' of McGonagall. "Firstly, it wasn't necessarily us…" the whole Hall noticed that he said us, not them "… and secondly, you don't really have any evidence of it, do you? I mean, it could've been anyone in here, even a Slytherin who wanted revenge for something. The school rules also clearly state that you cannot punish a student unless a confession has been made or the evidence is making it obvious who the offender was."  
Professor McGonagall opened her mouth and then closed it again before opening it one more time.

"I do suppose you are right, Mr Lupin." She said reluctantly. "Very well. I'll let you off the hook this time."  
"Thank you…" the brunet said, before getting a mischievous look in his green eyes and smirking slightly "Professor Minnie."

McGonagall, who had started to turn around to head back to the Head Table, quickly turned around again and stared at Remus.  
"Mr Lupin!" she exclaimed. James and Sirius watched Remus in surprise, but with obvious joy over the turn of events. "My name is Professor McGonagall, not Minnie." She caught herself and walked back to the Head Table.

Sirius pouted.  
"How come that when I call her Minnie I get points taken away but when you do it she doesn't do anything?"  
Remus smirked again.  
"She simply likes me more."  
James and Peter laughed.  
"You actually called her Minnie!" the Potter heir commented cheerfully. "And how did you talk your way out of it like that? You should work in Magical Law when you're a grown-up!"

For a moment Remus' face fell. One second he looked happy and filled with joy and the next he looked much older, like a weight had been put on his shoulders. But then he looked happy again, so quickly that James thought he might've imagined it, so he shrugged it off.  
"Perhaps." The lycanthrope said, smiling. "But I've got lot of time to think about it after all. And I didn't want to get detention, it's as easy as that."  
"But she wouldn't have given you detention." Peter pointed out. "She didn't even think about that you could've had a part in it."

Remus sulked.  
"I know. How offending." But then he grinned again. "But on the other hand, that means I can do whatever I want and never get into trouble; I can simply blame you three. She'll believe me."  
He winked and laughed loudly when the other three blew raspberries at him. It felt good to be back in the business of pranks again, he thought as he watched a Slytherin trying to change his hair back. It wouldn't go away for a week, Remus knew, but it was very funny to watch. Especially together with the three greatest friends in existence.

Suddenly he realized something.  
"Hey, what was it Minnie called us?" he asked his friends, who looked questioningly at him. After a moment Sirius shrugged.  
"Marauders? Was that what you meant? What does it mean?"  
"Someone who destroys things. Pirates were often called it. But you can also use it for troublemakers…" Remus grinned. James and Sirius joined in, guessing what he was thinking, but Peter looked confused.  
"What?" He asked and the three of them sighed, Remus a lot more discreet than James and Sirius, who didn't try to hide that they thought Peter was stupid right now.  
"What do you think about it as our new name?" James said, smiling eagerly. "The Marauders… Everyone agreeing says Aye!"  
" _Aye_!" Came jointly from the four of them.  
They grinned widely, Peter too now when he had caught up.

"Watch out, Hogwarts." Sirius said, smirking deviously. "The Marauders have entered the scene."

* * *

 **And that was it.**

 **Review! Did I do them justice? Because honestly, I've got no imagination when it comes to pranks. I can't come up with them. So you're welcome to give me tips on pranks they could've done! :)**

 **So... no more Goody-Two-Shoes Remus. Because we all know that Perfect Prefect Remus Lupin was just a cover for Devious Prankster Extraordinaire Moony. ^^**

 **Hayrlashuv! (Bye in Uzbek according to Translate)**


End file.
